Mahanati is a celebration of Savitri's life: Nag Ashwin

Legendary actress Savitri’s biopic is one of the much awaited films this season. It hits the screen on May 9th. Director Nag Ashwin calls this film as celebration of life. ‘Mahanati’ in Telugu and 'Nadigaiyar Thilagam' in Tamil is about the joy and a celebration of the great ‘Mahanati’ who ruled the hearts of millions then, now and forever. As a story teller and makers of the film we want people to appreciate her professional talent and being a beautiful mother and a family person, about her association with people who were part of her life from childhood to her passing away.

Producer Priyanka Dutt, Swapna Cinema, “for us the important thing was as a film-maker, the best we can do is get things right. Life is big and laden with troubles, awful and wonderful. It was indeed a massive task for us, in this film we have done our best to distil Savitri’s life story into two hours of quality entertainment”.

"Complementing our choice of Keerthy Suresh for the titular role of Savitri, Vijaya Chamundeswari (daughter of Savithri) had expressed it is a huge challenge to play this big role on her young shoulders, I found many qualities in Keerthy that kind of made me feel yes, she can pull it off. There was so many instances in the set that made not just me but many in the sets believe that Keerthy had mannerisms that strike lot of similarity like Savitri," adds the film maker.

Writer, director Nag Ashwin: "Savitri had immense, diverse talent, a director, playback singer, producer and someone who loved car racing. As a race car driver she won trophies. There are so many such beautiful facets of this actor she deserves to be reminisced today."

While Keerthy Suresh plays the role of Savitri, Dulquer Salmaan plays the role of Gemini Ganesan. Samantha Akkineni, Naga Chaitanya, Vijay Devarakonda also plays important role in the film along with other celebrated actors from the southern film industry.